Ross explains in the issue why he's recruiting these individuals, they're all like-minded like he is. Not everything is going to be explained in the first issue guys. I quite enjoyed Thunderbolts #1 and will be following at least the first arc. Basically this is the superhero version of X-Force, and I'm guessing from the tone of Ross's explanation to Frank that this is unsanctioned.

You need to at least a gist of where it's going in the first issue. We know "Uncanny Avengers" is about the Avengers and X-Men forming a joint team to deal with mutant issues and that the Red Skull stole Xavier's brain. We know "Avengers" is about the team getting bigger and global and we're introduced to a new set of villains and go into battle with them and we see a defeat and a rousing call to action... I actually thought Avengers #1 was pretty jam packed with story. We know "All New X-Men" is about the original team going into the future to meet their present selves and contrasting silver age and modern comic storytelling.

Thunderbolts #1 only told us that Ross was going around recruiting characters. That's it. Who's the bad guy? Why is he doing it? What is the series premise?

Thunderbolts seems to be going for the "proactive heroes" approach that usually fails in less than year.

Avengers was a good read, but the idea that the Avengers need to get "bigger" is an odd one considering the number of heroes that have passed through the doors of the mansion and type types of threats the team has faced over the years.

All-New X-Men. Scott whining "it wasn't me" for most the issue. I get that Emma lost her psi powers but Scott's change is puzzling. He has some sort of weird swirly blast happening. Which, while visually interesting, doesn't make sense. Not sure what was happening with Magneto's powers either.

Cap's motivations in Avengers #1 didn't make a lot of sense. The Avengers is already a huge team (taking it's various components in play) and they have faced now foes much "bigger" than a handful of Deux ex machina shmoes on Mars. I also don't know why, while Cap was unconscious for three days the rest of the super hero community ignored the fact that five Avengers were in the hands of some ne'er-do-wells on Mars.

Ross explains in the issue why he's recruiting these individuals, they're all like-minded like he is. Not everything is going to be explained in the first issue guys. I quite enjoyed Thunderbolts #1 and will be following at least the first arc. Basically this is the superhero version of X-Force, and I'm guessing from the tone of Ross's explanation to Frank that this is unsanctioned.

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For 10 pages over at the CBR forums the opinion is overwhelmingly that it's an unsatisfactory issue with an unsatisfying explanation by Ross. Being like minded isn't a full enough explanation.
Even those who said they went in with low expectations were let down.
This is just one I'll agree to disagree with you on since you seemed to like it.

Considering I dislike Daniel Way, I was surprised with how much I liked the issue. It was your typical recruiting issue. Most of it was spent building up what I assume will be the core relationship between Ross and Frank. I assume he intends Frank to be the field commander of the squad which is interesting. I'm not a big Steve Dillon fan before as I've stated in the thread earlier, but his art works for this issue. I understand what you guys are saying about not knowing the enemy or whatever, but this is a black ops squad. I'm sure Ross doesn't even know their targets or whoever they'll be going for yet and once he's compiled he's team together then we will know who they are going after and why and they'll be fully briefed about why they're all there.

For 10 pages over at the CBR forums the opinion is overwhelmingly that it's an unsatisfactory issue with an unsatisfying explanation by Ross.

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CBR forums being filled with rational, mature people of course!

Being like minded isn't a full enough explanation.

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Its more than enough of an explanation for a first issue in my opinion.

If there is no more of an explanation after 10, 20 or whatever issues then fine, complain, but complaining about it after 1 issue always seems stupid to me. It's akin to bitching that a novel doesnt explain everything in it's first chapater.

In today's market of $4 comic books in the Great Recession, you better hook your audience with the first issue. Disposable income is at an all time low.

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"Hooking" and "Explaining every detail inorganically" are two different things, though. Maybe the answers come up in a better way later on that there wasn't room for in the first issue for whatever reason the writer decided?

Maybe the issue just needed to be more interesting all around, providing the one line of dialogue stating (for example) "Alright, I brought you all because we all fought our common enemy before" probably won't be what catapults the issue from 2 out of 4 stars to 4 out of 4 stars.

In fact, I remember a time where questions helped draw the reader in. Not answers.

In today's market of $4 comic books in the Great Recession, you better hook your audience with the first issue. Disposable income is at an all time low.

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Or it's 60 bucks a year to get a digital subscription from marvel and god knows about dc because their website is being stupid about telling the damn prices. Assholes. It's probably a surprise they keep until after I put in my credit card number.

Methinks Marvel wants to stop making hard copies.

That's a dollar 15 cents a week to receive the entire new weekly catalogue each week which you can read on your ipad or your pc.

Honestly, you're all thinking about buying a new house because you don't have the square footage you need to store the next thousands and thousands of comics you plan to buy this year.

Meh.

If you moved over to digital, what would you suddenly do with all that money you had ear marked each week for comics?

So there are two reservoirs of digital comics the website doesn't take the time to distinguish or label or even display since I just spent 5 minutes looking for a complete catalogue and found fragments that go back a whole week and... they get paid by the page hit, from their advertisers so they don't want to make anything user friendly. Assholes.

It's no worse than trade waiting which as a more responsible adult now, you should be considering leaning towards anyway.

Although, I certainly agree with your screwing that sentimentality

6 months?

It's not like every weeks fresh discharge isn't all on piratebay by Wednesday afternoon.

And ironically, converting storebought digital comics to a universally usuable format for piracy takes about 30 seconds compared to the hour it used to take to take a comic apart with a boxcutter, scan the pages, and then edit everything for continguity and regulairity.

I liked Thunderbolts #1 enough to be interested in following the first arc and I HATE the character of Deadpool. Now that the team has been gathered they need to do something. I cant see what yet, but it better be something interesting.

Uncanny Avengers however I have found to be horrid. The resurrected Red Skull, who is clone of the original who has been asleep until recently is back, and completely wrong in character.

Avengers seemed forced to move us into a bigger team. As stated above the Avengers have beaten far more powerful foes without needing some big team assembled. Of course they didnt have a second movie coming out that will be space based so there is that.